Tag: contemporary fiction

#BookReview 337 by M. Jonathan Lee @HideawayFall #337LEE

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337About the Book

337 follows the life of Samuel Darte whose mother vanished when he was in his teens. It was his brother, Tom who found her wedding ring on the kitchen table along with the note.

While their father pays the price of his mother’s disappearance, Sam learns that his long-estranged Gramma is living out her last days in a nursing home nearby. Keen to learn about what really happened that day and realising the importance of how little time there is, he visits her to finally get the truth. Soon it’ll be too late and the family secrets will be lost forever. Reduced to ashes.

But in a story like this, nothing is as it seems.

Format: Paperback (384 pages)                Publisher: Hideaway Fall
Publication date: 30th November 2020 Genre: Contemporary fiction

Pre-order/Purchase links*
Waterstones | Amazon UK
*Links provided for convenience only, not as part of an affiliate programme

My Review

Like the two previous books by the author I’ve read, Broken Branches and Drift Stumble Fall, 337 is strong on the detail of domestic life – the annual picnic in the park, a Sunday roast dinner – and the dynamics of family relationships. For Samuel, the book’s narrator, his childhood is punctuated by memories of tensions simmering beneath the surface of his grandparents’ and his parents’ marriage which occasionally boil over.

It quickly becomes apparent that Samuel’s life has been overshadowed by his mother’s disappearance when he was a child and the author deftly illustrates the emotional and psychological impact this has had. Not only has it caused an estrangement from his father and younger brother Tom, but it has led him to spend time in therapy. The sense of ‘unfinished business’ has also contributed to the breakdown of his marriage. Yet still he feels a compulsive need to find answers to a disappearance the police have long since consigned to the drawer marked ‘cold case’.

His grandmother’s impending death signals what may be his final opportunity to discover why his mother left and what became of her. It’s a prospect Samuel finds too difficult to resist, even if it means overcoming a breach between him and his grandmother that’s lasted nearly twenty years.

Those attracted by the mystery element of the book will be pleased to know it is liberally sprinkled with enigmatic phrases that could either be important clues or playful red herrings. There are other quirky features, some of which left me scratching my head trying to work out if they had hidden significance, and others which made me smile. Readers drawn to the book by the promise of a domestic drama will be rewarded with poignant scenes as Samuel gently tries to coax information from his dying grandmother whilst at the same time struggling to understand his own feelings of helplessness and frustration. However, I believe every reader will recall the words ‘Nothing is as it seems’ as they turn the last page.

I was fortunate enough to receive a limited edition copy of the novel from the lovely people at Hideaway Fall with its unique double-ended upside-down format. (Please note the double-ended upside-down version of the book is only available if purchased in hard copy from UK booksellers.) However, in whatever format you read 337, I think you’ll find your emotions a little topsy turvy by the end.

The author’s self-imposed challenge was “to write a novel where the entire story hinges on the last word, which changes your view about many of the characters you’ve travelled through the story with“.  Success.

In three words: Inventive, touching, insightful

Try something similar: Tell Me Where You Are by Moira Forsyth

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MJonathanLeeAbout the Author

M. Jonathan Lee is a nationally shortlisted author and mental health campaigner.  His debut novel, The Radio, was nationally shortlisted for the Novel Prize 2012. Since that time he has gone on to publish five further novels. 337 is his sixth novel. He is obsessed by novels with twists where nothing is exactly how it first appears.  He was born in Yorkshire where he still lives to this day with his twins, James and Annabel.

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#BookReview This Green and Pleasant Land by Ayisha Malik @ZaffreBooks @ReadersFirst1

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This Green and Pleasant Land Ayisha MalikAbout the Book

For years Bilal Hasham and his wife Mariam have lived contented, quiet lives in the sleepy, rural village of Babbel’s End. Now all that is about to change.

On her deathbed, Bilal’s mother reaches for his hand. Instead of whispering her final prayers, she gives him a task: build a mosque in his country village.

Mariam is horrified by Bilal’s plan. His friends and neighbours are unnerved. As outrage sweeps Babbel’s End, battle lines are drawn. His mother’s dying wish reveals deeper divisions in their village than Bilal had ever imagined.

Soon Bilal is forced to choose between community and identity, between faith and friendship, between honouring his beloved mother’s last wish and preserving what is held dear in the place that he calls home.

Format: Hardcover (454 pages)       Publisher: Zaffre
Publication date:  13th June 2019  Genre: Contemporary Fiction

Find This Green and Pleasant Land on Goodreads

Purchase links*
Amazon UK | Hive (supporting UK bookshops)
*links provided for convenience not as part of an affiliate programme

My Review

In Babbel’s End, the author creates a picture of a community which exhibits all the features of small village life: gossip, petty rivalries and disputes between neighbours, the latter exemplified by the hilarious “battle of Tom’s bush”.  However, a recent tragedy has exposed the village to very modern day issues and the response to it (or lack of response to it) has heightened tensions.  As one character observes, “Living in their farmland, thinking nothing’s more important than a fete or a stolen ceramic pot; in the meantime, to hell with what anyone’s going through.” For Richard, the community’s vicar, the tragedy has caused him to doubt his ability to provide comfort where needed, including at a very personal level. “He seemed to have lost the ability to inspire people to faith or find the right words to help people in distress.”

Bilal, his wife Mariam, and son Haaris have embraced village life. In fact, their relocation from Birmingham to Babbel’s End was a deliberate move to escape his family’s expectations that he maintain aspects of his Pakistani heritage despite his having been born in Britain.  His mother’s deathbed wish changes all that, particularly when the strength of opposition becomes clear.  As disapproval bubbles over into overt racism, things get very personal and Bilal is tempted to forget the whole idea. “Change was meant for fascist states and oppressive governments, not serene, bobbing-along, minding-it’s-own-business Babbel’s End.”

As the news of Bilal’s mission goes viral, it becomes a bigger issue than just church versus mosque but raises questions of identity, religious freedom and diversity. As Bilal observes, “What did everyone even mean by English? Bilal was English. Though he could concede that having a mosque in the middle of the village might not be. Surely you could be and want two different things at the same time?”

My favourite character in the book was Bilal’s Aunt (Khala) Rukhsana.  Speaking little English, at first she is something of a fish out of water.  However, she demonstrates the ability to reach out to people in other ways and really does emerge as the heroine of the piece.  For instance, I loved the gradual blossoming of her relationship with Mariam, especially their joint ‘assault’ on the school bake sale substituting the usual cupcakes for something traditionally Indian. “And so they began the process of making the sweet, fragrant, yellow rice, to give everyone in Babbel’s End a taste of what was to come.”

This Green and Pleasant Land teaches us that divisions can be healed if we just take the time to understand the other person’s point of view, that it’s important to seize the day and that, in the words of Rukhsana, “home must be where you feel most alive”.

I received a review copy courtesy of Zaffre and Readers First.

In three words: Warm, engaging, uplifting

Try something similar: The Music Shop by Rachel Joyce

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Ayisha MalikAbout the Author

Ayisha Malik is a writer and editor, living in South London. She holds a BA in English Literature and a First Class MA in Creative Writing. Her novels Sofia Khan is Not Obliged and The Other Half of Happiness, starring ‘the Muslim Bridget Jones’, were met with great critical acclaim, and Sofia Khan is Not Obliged was chosen as 2019’s Cityread book. Ayisha was a WHSmith Fresh Talent Pick, shortlisted for the Asian Women of Achievement Award and Marie Claire’s Future Shapers Awards. Ayisha is also the ghost writer for The Great British Bake Off winner, Nadiya Hussain.

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